Teen sentenced to life in wrestling death

Posted: Saturday, March 10, 2001

By Terry SpencerAssociated Press

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- A boy who says he was imitating body-slamming pro wrestlers when he killed a little girl at age 12 was sentenced to life in prison without parole Friday after a judge refused to reduce his first-degree murder conviction.

Tears rolled down Lionel Tate's cheeks and he was led away in handcuffs and leg shackles to begin serving the sentence, which was mandatory under a tough-on-crime law enacted a few years ago.

Tate, now 14, becomes one of the youngest defendants in the United States ever to be sentenced to spend the rest of his life behind bars.

The prosecutor himself suggested the sentence was too harsh, but he also noted that the boy's lawyer and his mother had repeatedly rejected a plea bargain that would have meant only three years in a juvenile prison.

Defense team member Laurie Butts, left, comforts Lionel Tate, 14, as he reacts after Judge Joel T. Lazarus sentenced him to life in prison at the Broward County Courhouse in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Friday. Tate, 14, was convicted of first-degree murder in the death of a playmate last year. Assistant appellate attorney Denise Bregoff looks on at right.Marsha Halper/AP

Tate was found guilty Jan. 25 of beating Tiffany to death at his home. Tiffany suffered a fractured skull, a lacerated liver and more than 30 other injuries on July 28, 1999, from being punched, kicked, stomped and thrown.

During the trial, the defense argued that the 170-pound boy did not mean to kill the 48-pound girl and thought he could body-slam people and they would walk away unhurt, just like his wrestling idols on television.

On Friday, the judge rejected a defense request to throw out Tate's conviction or reduce it to second-degree murder or manslaughter, saying: ''The evidence of Lionel Tate's guilt is clear, obvious and indisputable.''

The judge also questioned the defense argument that Tate was imitating pro wrestlers. ''It is inconceivable that such injuries could be caused by roughhousing or horseplay or by replicating wrestling moves,'' he said.

Tate's mother, Kathleen Grossett-Tate, a Florida Highway Patrol trooper who described Tiffany's death to the judge as a ''tragic accident,'' showed no reaction to the sentence. Several family friends and relatives wailed.

Lionel Tate, 14, cries after Judge Joel T. Lazarus sentenced him to life in prison at the Broward County Courhouse in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Friday. The boy who was 12 when he killed a little girl while imitating professional wrestlers was sentenced Friday to life in prison without parole after a judge refused to dismiss his first-degree murder conviction. Marsha Halper/AP

Defense attorney Jim Lewis had tried to put pro wresting and TV itself on trial. But the judge blocked him from calling as witnesses wrestling stars Hulk Hogan and The Rock, or from summoning psychologists to testify about the effect of pro wrestling on children.

Lewis said he will appeal and also ask Gov. Jeb Bush to reduce the sentence.

Prosecutor Ken Padowitz urged the judge to uphold the first-degree murder conviction but said he will support the request for clemency from the governor.

This article published in the Athens Daily News on Saturday, March 10, 2001.